The book Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan was published roughly 17 years ago. Altered Carbon is one of those books that blows your mind in a surprising way. The TV series adaptation feels very close to Neuromancer and the cyber punk genre in its style. The story takes place in a dystopian society were technology has divided us even further. The rich and powerful are living a decadent life up in the clouds, were the sun always shines. The rest of the population are fighting for survival in a depraved world.
A body is referred to as a sleeve. A person can be resurrected into another sleeve after his/her death. A person with enough money can grow a stack of clones of him selves. The elite are constantly backed up through a needle cast. This makes them almost immortal. The poor are stuck with the sleeves that naturally occur through death. If they can afford a sleeve at all that is.
The strength of the story is the interesting meetings that happens through the sleeve transfers. An old grandmother is resleeved in a thugs body just to enjoy the holidays with her children and grand children. A mans wive is resleeved as a man. As the same person is resleeved into different genders and races I ask myself. What is the essence of my personality? How would immortality shape my judgement?